Keith, have you ever done a piece on Ulysses? If anyone could persuade me to give it another look, it would be you or Scott. I love art that is challenging, but this particular work felt like more of a chore than a pleasure for me when I finally dove into (and then stopped) reading it a few months ago.
Unless my senior thesis counts, no, I’ve never written about Ulysses. Here’s what I’d recommend: read a chapter then go back and read it again looking at annotations. I used to have a book called ULYSSES ANNOTATED (until I loaned it to someone who never returned it). I’m currently revisiting it intermittently using the edition linked to below on my Kindle, which is pretty good. But the thing to keep in mind is it’s ok not to get everything. Joyce is throwing a flood of language at you and the narrative can seem murky. But it’s worth putting in the work. It’s funny with breathtakingly heartbreaking bits. And it’s wise about the divide between youth and adulthood in the way few books are. And I think Joyce was right that, were Dublin ever destroyed, it could be rebuilt from the details he included (or at least the Dublin of 1904).
I might start at chapter 4. It's the first chapter about Leopold Bloom. His chapters are generally more amiable and a little easier to follow. See if it grabs you a little more and you might have a more motivation to go back to the opening chapters about Stephen, maybe with a guide like Keith said.
Hah... so I posted previously about having a hard time with Godard beyond BREATHLESS, in relation to PIERROT LE FOU. Glad this article exists, because there's almost no way I'm going to watch it myself.
There are movies in the top 100 that I've seen, possibly only once and years ago, that I really just don't remember a single thing about outside of maybe a single still shot of a scene in my mind.
This is the one movie that I still have never watched to date (it was vaguely on my to-do list from the past decade due to it being on the 2012 list).
I meant to watch it this year. The DVD is on the shelf staring at me. I just haven't mustered the focus to actually put it on. I feel like after reading this essay, it's going to shift further onto the backburner, unless I do the, "just put it on, let it wash over you at times, feel free to get up and walk around and do other stuff here and there, and come back to the parts you missed earlier," type of first watch. Which, this is sounding like a real candidate for doing that with.
Thank you! A terrific essay. Looking forward to more.
Keith, have you ever done a piece on Ulysses? If anyone could persuade me to give it another look, it would be you or Scott. I love art that is challenging, but this particular work felt like more of a chore than a pleasure for me when I finally dove into (and then stopped) reading it a few months ago.
Unless my senior thesis counts, no, I’ve never written about Ulysses. Here’s what I’d recommend: read a chapter then go back and read it again looking at annotations. I used to have a book called ULYSSES ANNOTATED (until I loaned it to someone who never returned it). I’m currently revisiting it intermittently using the edition linked to below on my Kindle, which is pretty good. But the thing to keep in mind is it’s ok not to get everything. Joyce is throwing a flood of language at you and the narrative can seem murky. But it’s worth putting in the work. It’s funny with breathtakingly heartbreaking bits. And it’s wise about the divide between youth and adulthood in the way few books are. And I think Joyce was right that, were Dublin ever destroyed, it could be rebuilt from the details he included (or at least the Dublin of 1904).
I appreciate the response! I’ll give it another go with this in mind.
"(until I loaned it to someone who never returned it)"
Are you saying it's underneath that copy of Lady Snowblood you once lent out?
(I think I'm correctly recalling which movie was lent to one Mr. Tobias years ago)
Shhhhhh.... don't remind him.
I might start at chapter 4. It's the first chapter about Leopold Bloom. His chapters are generally more amiable and a little easier to follow. See if it grabs you a little more and you might have a more motivation to go back to the opening chapters about Stephen, maybe with a guide like Keith said.
Hah... so I posted previously about having a hard time with Godard beyond BREATHLESS, in relation to PIERROT LE FOU. Glad this article exists, because there's almost no way I'm going to watch it myself.
That was all very fascinating, but I'm certain I will never watch this, much as I will never read Finnegan's Wake.
Though after trying and failing at 18 and 28, I finally cracked Ulysses last year at 38.
You’re now Leopold Bloom’s age, if that’s incentive.
And older than Homer Simpson.
Sounds like the kind of thing to put on during a rainy Saturday and let it wash over you. Consider me curious.
There are movies in the top 100 that I've seen, possibly only once and years ago, that I really just don't remember a single thing about outside of maybe a single still shot of a scene in my mind.
This is the one movie that I still have never watched to date (it was vaguely on my to-do list from the past decade due to it being on the 2012 list).
I meant to watch it this year. The DVD is on the shelf staring at me. I just haven't mustered the focus to actually put it on. I feel like after reading this essay, it's going to shift further onto the backburner, unless I do the, "just put it on, let it wash over you at times, feel free to get up and walk around and do other stuff here and there, and come back to the parts you missed earlier," type of first watch. Which, this is sounding like a real candidate for doing that with.